It was necessary for Yeshua to descend into the water so that he could perfect and consecrate it. So also they who receive baptism in his name may be perfected. He said, “It is right in this way to perfect all that is just” (Gospel of Phillip).

*See the Gospel of Matthew 3:15

When Adonai Yeshua descended into the waters of the Sacred Jordan and rose up receiving the Holy Spirit and the full influx of the Supernal Light, all souls that would come to faith and cleave to him were held in his heart and were with him, and rising up from the waters sparks of the Soul of the Messiah went into those souls, and they were unified with the Messiah, the Anointed of God, the True Light - souls of the faithful and chosen past, present and future were with him, all that were to be gathered in until the end of the ages. Likewise, all waters were purified and consecrated, and they were made perfect - life and light from the Supernal Abode came into them, and so living waters were generated for the holy rite of baptism, the rebirth of souls from above, from their Great Natural Perfection in God Most High (El Elyon).

So through the waters of the Sacred Jordan and the Holy Cross he opened the Way, being the Way, Truth and Life Divine, and going down into the living waters in faith and love, so we are raised up in the Great Resurrection and Ascension with Messiah, to stand among the living ones, the immortals, in the Pleroma of Light, the Supernal Abode.

Understand, in Messiah Yeshua it is not that we are imperfect and therefore made perfect, but rather that in Messiah Yeshua our innate perfection in God Most High, the Absolute Light, is revealed, and being established in the Real - God Most High. All that is unreal, all sin, all husks of impurity and darkness, along with death, are dispelled or removed from us. Thus, the innate perfection, the Holy Light and Spirit, can shine from within us, and we may be as a ‘clear mirror’ reflecting the face of God, just as with the Son of Man, Son of God.

I will tell you, when Adonai Yeshua went down into the waters of the Sacred Jordan and rose up, so also did we, and again, when we went down into the living waters and rose up, so also did he; in his baptism ours was completed and perfected, and in our baptism his was completed and perfected, God being glorified as the Body of Messiah comes into being throughout the ages, souls realizing the Great Natural Perfection in the Messiah, the Clear Light Nature, which is the Primordial and Supernal Foundation of all.

As it is taught elsewhere in this Gnostic Gospel, however, if we go down in the water and rise up receiving nothing - if we do not receive our anointing with the Holy Light and Spirit, then our baptism is incomplete, for the Light and Life of Messiah has not come into us, we remain in the darkness, ignorance, death, unable to see, hear and feel with God, and so as yet without knowledge of the Messiah, the Anointing. Indeed, for as we know in our experience there is a baptism of water and the Spirit, and it is the Spirit of God that brings the realization of the Great Natural Perfection.

Here we may say that just as Yeshua opened the way for us, it is given that we open the way for those who follow after us, and so it is that when we go down into the living waters in faith and love, cleaving to the Risen and Ascended Messiah, we co-labor with Messiah Yeshua in the purification and consecration of the waters in our time and place, our generation, for generations to come. As in everything, including the rite of ransom - the Holy Cross, we co-labor with the Messiah and Holy Spirit in all mysteries of the Gospel.

In this, perhaps, you may understand that we do not go down into the living waters and rise up for ourselves alone, but rather in proxy, holding all creatures, all humanity, all living spirits and souls in our hearts, having the heart wish, the passionate desire, for the salvation of all, the enlightenment and liberation of all in Messiah.

The Spirit stirred my heart and took me up while contemplating this passage today so I was inclined to share these thoughts on it.

May many be gathered in this day and passing through the living waters may they have true life, the Holy Spirit coming upon them! Amen.

There is one question and I’ve been really pondering from this post: How did Yeshua consecrate the waters as he went down into them? Does the consecration come from the waters being the vehicle by which the Messiah was baptized? What about when others are baptized; are those waters also concentrated?

I was also wondering if we could hear saying 50 from the Gospel of St. Thomas: “If they ask you, 'What is the sign of your father within you?' say to them, 'It is movement and repose.’”

Can we say that the waters are movement and Yeshua is repose? Therefore together, they create this sign of the Living Father? I also hear that the waters and John the Baptist are facilitating an experience for Yeshua, and Yeshua simultaneously is facilitating an experience for them? This sounds a lot like light transmission, where the Tzaddik and disciple are having the same experience, the experience coming from a state of merging with one another in God, in the One.

We pray that all beings are uplifted this day by the power of Yeshua Messiah in God Most High—El Elyon, Amen!

Perhaps you may recall what is written in genesis about that outset of creation, that the Spirit of God was over the surface of the deep, the ‘waters.’ Through Yeshua Messiah the fullness of that Holy Spirit entered into the ‘waters,’ creation, completing and perfecting them. Although in various measures that Living Spirit had entered into the ‘waters,’ creation, before, until Adonai Yeshua appeared at the Sacred Jordan the fullness of the Holy Light and Spirit of God had never been embodied in this world. Thus, Yeshua went to the waters and was immersed in them, and the Spirit descending upon him in full so also fully entered into the waters, creation, perfecting them.

With this noble gesture, inseparable from the Great Gesture of the Holy Cross, Adonai Yeshua changed the waters on a spiritual and metaphysical level, bringing ‘life’ into them - spiritual and supernal light and blessing. When we enact this holy and sacred rite with and in Messiah Yeshua, so we receive this Holy Light and Spirit and are reborn from above, from the Pleroma of Light, having been buried with him and raised with him to true life and light; hence, to perfection, completion, in God, the True Light.

Here we may say, if and when a faithful person goes down into the living waters and rises up and they receive the actual anointing with the Holy Light and Spirit, in that very moment, in that very place and time, there is this influx of radiance of the Supernal Crown - the Light of the Messiah. Just as Adonai Yeshua, along with his disciples and followers, opened the way for others of their generation and future generations through their submitting to baptism - immersion in the living waters, so also when we surrender to Divine Grace in this way we open the way for others to awaken and turn to God and be reborn of water and the Spirit.

Having been reborn in this way, as Yeshua teaches, we deny ourselves - laboring with the Spirit to reach into the station of passing away, and we take our cross and follow in the Way; hence, we make our life an offering in service to the kingdom of heaven for the sake of the awakening and healing of others - the ‘salvation’ of all. To gnostics salvation is not vicarious, nor is it personal, but rather it is participatory and our labor for salvation is not for ourselves alone, our own salvation, but rather for the sake of others, for the salvation of others, it is sake for the kingdom of heaven and glorification of God. Thus, it is given to us to take up all mysteries of the Gospel, and all Divine Actions, with and in the Messiah, and to surrender to Divine Grace, letting the indwelling Messiah and Holy Spirit take up our person and life, and so all of our actions. In this regard the coming of the Messiah is understood among Sophian Gnostics as an ongoing Divine Action with, in and through us; hence, our understanding of the Second Coming, that it is the Messiah becoming embodied, incarnate, in us - first in our Elder Brother and Sister, and then in us.

We also are to stand as ‘elder’ sisters and brothers to those who come after us, laboring that they might be uplifted in the Great Ascension, raised well in the Great Resurrection. May God grant us the wisdom of skillful means in this and all spiritual gifts and resources necessary for this Great Work. Amen.

There is something more that is given in the Spirit concerning this mystery or perfecting the waters, creation. Understand, if indeed we have received our anointing with the Holy Light and Spirit, and the Messiah and Holy Spirit indwells us, taking up our person and life, then within us is the power for the redemption and healing of creatures, the ability to bring the spiritual essence of things into them and to draw out something of the spark, the light, that is within them; hence, power to complete and perfect creation (tikkune of creation).

Just as the Messiah - the Perfect Human Being, perfected the waters, so all creation, and we also are called to labor with the Messiah and Holy Spirit for the completion and perfection of creation - creatures, on earth and in heaven. Thus, among Gnostic Christians there is an energetic ‘preaching’ of the Gospel to all creatures, all creation, not just to human beings, and there is an active labor for the awakening and uplifting of all to God. You may recall something Yohanan the Baptist said in rebuke to those who considered themselves ‘children of Abraham,’ or Jews, and thought that they were special or superior to other people. Gesturing at stones he told them that God could raise up children of Israel from stones. Understand that mystics, gnostics, of Supernal Realization know he wasn’t joking, but was stating a metaphysical fact. There are sparks of holiness in all things, and the journey of spirits and souls in their evolution and awakening passes through the mineral, vegetable and animal realms into the human realm, as well as through other realms of existence in the subtle inner dimensions. Therefore, in truth, the spirit or soul in a rock will eventually evolve, pass on, and in the course of its transmigration will eventually receive the Messiah - Anointing, and come into being as a holy and enlightened one, being reintegrated with the Infinite Light. So literally, the salvation in the Messiah is for all creatures, all sentient beings, including those that may at present appear inanimate - they too are manifestations of God Most High, the One Being-Consciousness-Force. Do know and understand, as things are in themselves they are not equal, but as they are in God they are all equal, their very essence being the Absolute Light, their very existence being inseparable from the Holy One of Being.

In effect you may say that we co-labor with and in the Messiah for the awakening of God to God in creatures, creation, and so labor for the manifestation of the kingdom of heaven on earth in this way; in effect when spirits and souls awaken and ‘return’ to God, God is awakening and God is returning to God - God is ‘remembering’ Godself, as it were, knowing Godself. This is the experience of ‘Gnostic Being,’ God invoking God, God praying to God, God knowing God; and so a soul comes to ‘know God as they have been known.’

In a true baptism, we experience rebirth, renewal, and purification to become the body of Messiah. In this emptiness, we can see, hear, taste, and touch in the Holy Spirit for:

within us is the power for the redemption and healing of creatures, the ability to bring the spiritual essence of things into them and to draw out something of the spark, the light, that is within them

This is mysterious, and I can see it as we labour in love with an open heart at work, with family, in community and with all who the Holy One puts on our path.

I would understand the spark and light within that is revealed is the “divine spark”, which has recently been written and spoken about. What is this “spiritual essense” that we bring through the Holy Spirit? It feels like it is related to peace and the radiant holy breath.

So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them (John 20:21,22)

Within and behind all things there is a spirit or soul, and their is a corresponding angel, and there is a spark of holiness, a divine spark, and so it may be said that God is within all things and all things are in God - God is in things as their divine spark, a spark of the Infinite Light. In truth the very existence of all things, the very being of all things, is God, the True Light; the essence of all things is drawn from the Essence of God, the being of all things is drawn from the Being of God - as the Divine Attribute Yesod-Foundation teaches us, ‘God is the foundation of creation,’ all spirits and souls, all creatures.

Do understand that in the Divine Presence, Holy Shekinah, Holy Spirit, it is possible to communicate and commune with the spirit of things, whether stones, plants, animals or humans, and so also it is possible to commune with the angels set over them, just as we can commune with other angels. In a deep communion it may even come to pass that God within us may commune with God within things before us and around us, divine sparks mingling, as it were, in an intimate exchange of light and life, knowing one another in the Divine Presence.

If, indeed, we are an insider, aware of our inwardness and revelations of God in our heart - having knowledge of who and what we are in God, then naturally we will have awareness, knowledge, of the inwardness of others, and of things, more or less, and we will have a sense of feeling who and what they are in God. In this awareness, knowledge, there is a ability to draw out the light and good from within things, or to draw out what they are in the Living God, and this action is a natural and spontaneous movement of love and compassion, and seeing things in their innate perfection, seeing as God sees, if you will.

The spiritual essences of things, creatures, corresponds with who or what they are in God, in the Pleroma of Light, and when this is seen, heard and felt in the Divine Presence so in effect something of the spiritual essence is drawn into things, creatures.

As we know, in the Messiah there is a new creation, a new heaven and earth, and new humanity, and in the Messiah it is given to us to co-labor to give birth to the new creation, to bring about the tikkune of creation, its realization, completion, perfection in God Most High. This corresponds with the invocation of the spiritual essences of things, creatures, into them, and the calling out of the light of their divine spark.

In this light consider the curious passage in Genesis of Adam naming all creatures in God’s presence, the ‘name’ corresponding to their spiritual essence and being, and the manifestation of the presence and power of God with, in and through them, and as them; hence, their unique manifestation of the Holy Shekinah.

In this light also consider teachings of the Magical Kabbalah - the wonderworking art, in which we invoke the Names of God and angels, but also all manner of living spirits into the service of the Continuum, or kingdom of God. In so doing we lead them into the fulfillment of their true will, their true desire, or being who and what they are in God; hence, ‘bringing their spiritual essence into them.’ This, of course, is true of all things we take up in service to the Great Work of the kingdom of heaven, even the apparently mundane things.

Consider for a moment the food we eat, for an example. There are sparks of holiness in everything we eat and drink. If we bless our food and drink, and we give thanks to God for it, we draw upon the sparks within it, gathering their radiance into our soul, and if then with the energy the food provides we serve the kingdom of God and we worship God, those sparks of holiness are uplifted and are returned to God, the True Light. Understand, blessing food is invoking its spiritual essence into it, and then using that energy serving the Lord uplifts the sparks, unifying them with the Lord, Yahweh, Yeshua.

When we speak of the spiritual essence and drawing the spiritual essence into things, this is uniting what things are in themselves with what they are in God, what things are in God corresponding with their ‘spiritual essence.’

If, indeed, we walk in the Messiah, in beauty and holiness, and we see with God, hear with God and feel with God, and we taste, smell and touch with God, so the spiritual essences of things will be drawn into them, the sparks of holiness in them being actualized and uplifted, reintegrated with the Light of the Infinite, Light of the Messiah.

These are a few thoughts I can share with you.

May we walk with the Lord in beauty and holiness and hold the conscious intention of the realization of sparks and their return to God, the True Light! Amen.